The present invention provides an optimally modular and proportionately structurable packaging system and method for composing propellant charges without undue limitations on the number of zones (power or amounts of propellant needed for a particular shot) that can be fired. The invention is a method and system for packaging solid explosive artillery propellant in proportional amounts. Modules in the proportions specified by this invention can be combined to compose a total amount of loaded propellant that is nearly optimum for shooting at a specific target. One of the unique aspects of this invention includes its teachings that a sufficiently large number of zones could be composed using only two different sizes of charge containers thereby providing efficiency and ease in handling, shipping, and manufacturing.
Artillery projectiles are fired using total amounts of propellant that are selected to reach a designated target along a predetermined trajectory with a specific projectile type. Different guns use different kinds of propellant; for example: liquid propellant, bags of solid propellant, and rigid canisters of solid propellant. For a specific gun and propellant type, the amount of propellant used for a given shot, the zone, varies depending upon the distance to the target and the shape of the desired trajectory. Liquid propellant guns. allow a nearly infinite number of zones by metering the amount of liquid used. Liquid propellant guns are therefore theoretically capable of firing whatever trajectory is optimum to engage the target. Contemporary solid propellant systems are not as flexible. Because solid propellant is manufactured in uniformly sized modules, such as bags or combustible canisters, the number of different zones that can be fired is comparatively small. One or more modules of propellant are loaded prior to shooting the gun. Modules are indivisible and only complete modules can be loaded. Hence solid propellant guns must shoot along trajectories limited by the zones available. These result from using an integral number of modules (of the order of two to six), and these are not always the optimum shots.
The present invention achieves flexibility and adaptability to a variety of zones for solid propellants. The VIMAP structure provides a modular system of charge increments that can be assembled to compose different zones. The invention permits a module-based increment to be packaged in different ways, for example combustible canisters or bags. Specifically, various zones of total propellant power are constructed using two different module sizes. The modules are manufactured so that their propellant power is in the ratio of two consecutive integers greater than one. For example, the consecutive integers may be 2 and 3 or 3 and 4. In other words, an arrangement based on the integers 2 and 3 shall yield a smaller module that is ⅔ the propellant power of the larger. Similarly, if based on the integers 3 and 4, the smaller module shall be xc2xe of the propellant power of the larger. Such modules would be combined in different arrangements to compose numerous zones.